Before Facebook and Twitter were invented, the
Romans also had a place to express their useless opinions. And this
served them their Forum. Or, more precisely, a place called Rostra.
Rostra was built by order of Julius Caesar in the middle of the 1st
century. It was here, according to Shakespeare, that Mark Antony
delivered his famous speech after the murder of Caesar: "Romans,
fellow citizens and friends! Listen to how I will speak for myself."
Later, Cicero's head and arms were exposed here. The wife of
Mark Antony Fulvia pierced his tongue with a hairpin. Ironically,
Mark Antony himself was defeated in the naval battle of Antinius in
31 BC. The noses of warships or the rostra were added to the
existing podium. Hence the name Rostra or Rostral colon.
Consecrated under the consulate of Aulus Sempronio
Atratino and Marco Minucio Augurino (497 BC), the Temple of Saturn is
the oldest sacred place in Rome after the Temple of Vesta and that of
Jupiter. Home to the state treasury, the temple contained a statue of
Saturn that was filled with oil and wrapped in woolen bandages. During
the Saturnalia, the festivities that were held from 17 to 23 December,
the bandages were removed, a public banquet was held, gambling was
allowed; according to tradition, the festivities ended with the cry of
"Io Saturnalia". During the seven days of festivities, the most famous
in Rome, the social order based on masters and slaves was subverted and
the masters served their slaves at mealtimes. In this place there was an
ancient altar, to be connected, according to tradition, to the mythical
foundation of the city on the Capitol by Saturn. In fact, the legend
confirms the presence of a village on the hill since the protohistoric
period and the antiquity of the Saturnian cult, already present in the
"Latium Vetus" during the golden age (Cfr. Saturnian city).
Construction must have already begun in the royal period, with the
inauguration in the very first years of the Republic. According to
scholars, the date of the first consecration fluctuates between 501 and
498 BC: the sources report as voted (promised in vote) by King Tarquinio
the Superb and dedicated by Tito Larcio (dictator on both dates). Other
sources attribute it to a Lucio Furio, but it is perhaps a restoration
at the beginning of the 4th century BC. following the destruction of the
Gallic fire. It would therefore be the oldest temple of the republican
period, second only to the temple of Jupiter Capitoline.
The dies
natalis of the temple corresponded to December 17, the feast of the
Saturnalia, on the occasion of which the end of the year was celebrated
in wild freedom.
Ancient sources recall that the cult statue,
veiled and holding a scythe, was hollow and entirely filled with oil.
The legs were tied with woolen bandages, untied only on the occasion of
the Saturnalia.
The temple kept the state treasury (aerarium)
which the quaestors took care of, the state archives, the insignia and a
scale for the official weighing of the metal. Subsequently the aerarium
had to be moved to a special building nearby and the archives were also
transferred to the Tabularium. The podium of the temple was used for the
posting of laws and public documents.
A total renovation of the
building took place starting from 42 BC. by the consul Lucio Munazio
Planco, with the spoils of his triumph over the Alpine population of the
Reti, or according to other sources with the spoils of war taken in
Syria.
After the Sorrentine fire in 283 A.D. it had to be
restored again.
The currently visible remains of the building belong both to this
phase (podium) and to the restoration of the late 3rd century, to which
we owe the column shafts in gray and pink granite (only those of the
facade and the first two of the sides remain) and the capitals
four-sided ionics.
The entablature is made up of reused elements:
the frieze-architrave shows the original decoration of the late
2nd-early 3rd century on the inner side of the pronaos, while the back
was reworked to accommodate the new dedication inscription, which
recalls the reconstruction after a fire: SENATUS POPULUSQUE ROMANUS
INCENDIO CONSUMPTUM RESTITUIT. The frame with shelves is still that of
Munazio Planco's building, reassembled. Due to the enlargement, the
blocks of the entablature were integrated with smaller blocks, placed in
the center of each capital.
The podium in cementitious work
covered with travertine dates back to the most ancient restructuring by
Munazio Planco, with a front staircase that crossed a forepart (largely
collapsed) within which a room was open. This room was accessed from a
door to the east, of which the threshold still remains. This is probably
where the Treasury, the treasury of the Roman state, was located.
The eastern facade of the podium shows the numerous holes that draw
the shape of a large rectangular panel, where various public documents
were posted, widely quoted by the sources.
To the east of the
Temple the Via Sacra ended, crossing with the vicus Iugarius and
continuing, around the façade, as a Capitoline clivus. Just before the
intersection was the disappeared arch of Tiberius (16 AD, celebrating
the victories of Germanicus).
The Rostra (in Latin Rostra) were the tribunes in the Roman forum
from which the magistrates held their prayers. The name derives from the
prows of the enemy ships (rostrum in fact) torn by the Romans during the
victorious battle of Anzio, which were placed here in 338 BC.
Republican Rostra
The most ancient Rostra (Rostra vetera), were part
of the Comitium, the circular square of public political assemblies, in
particular they occupied the arched tiers on the south-eastern side,
with the concavity facing north.
The republican bolts remained in
use until they were demolished to make room for the Forum of Caesar.
Of the republican Rostra, only a circular arched base remains,
between the altar of the Lapis niger and the facade of the Curia Iulia,
visible today through a trap door that opens into the travertine floor
of the age of Augustus.
They adorned the republican beaks:
The
statues of the three Sibyls;
The statue of Camillo;
The statues of
ambassadors who died during their missions, especially those who died in
Fidene by Queen Teuta.
Imperial Rostra
Cesare had the Rostra
rebuilt in the center of the short side of the rectangular square of the
Forum, behind the new Curia Iulia and the Campidoglio hill. In the first
years of the second triumvirate, the heads and hands of the citizens on
the ban list were attacked here, including the renowned orator Cicero
(43 BC).
They were inaugurated in 29 BC. From him they also took
the name of Rostra Iulia. Empty of their political function, they were
gradually covered with statues and celebratory monuments, becoming a
purely symbolic place.
Of the Rostri there remain the remains of
the square façade placed almost adjacent to the arch of Septimius
Severus. They measured about 23.80 meters (80 Roman feet) and the part
made up of small cemented stones is the result of modern restorations.
You can still see the large pin holes that held the naval "bolts". The
rear part, which faces the Capitol, is composed of a semicircular
staircase, which recalled the original shape of the Republican Rostrums.
The actual platform of the oratories, probably wooden, was supported by
some brick pillars still visible (perhaps originally in travertine). The
part towards the Arch is still richly covered with marble (in the
qualities of portasanta and "African" - the latter name being misleading
as it is a stone originating from Asia Minor), in correspondence with
where there was a triangular room that contained, in bottom, another
ladder to the upper platform. To the north there is also a brick
extension, which an inscription attributes to the prefect Ulpius Giunio
Valentino, who lived around 470 AD: perhaps this extension was carried
out following the victory over the Vandals, which is why it is also
called the Rostra Vandalica.
In a relief of the arch of
Constantine he shows five columns behind the Rostra. Two bases of this
group were found with inscriptions in the Renaissance, which were later
lost: one commemorated the twentieth anniversary of the Augusti
(Augustorum vicennalia feliciter), the other the twentieth anniversary
of the emperors (Vicennalia Imperatorum); the latter base was perhaps
the central one and held a statue of Jupiter, while the others held
statues of the emperors. A third base is the only one that has come down
to us, the base of the Decennalia.
More beaks
In the Forum
there were three stands of Rostri: the most important was that of the
imperial Rostra, then there were those placed on the podium of the
temple of Divo Giulio (where Augustus had placed the beaks of the enemy
ships beaten in the battle of Actium) and those of the temple of the
Dioscuri . Together they made up the so-called Rostra tria.